Sky broadband - Orange broadband problems

lkm020

Hi Oakey22. I have just applied to Sky for Broadband Max, not active yet. What kind of Router/modem did they send you? Was it a Netgear DG834GT? This is what i got. The Netgear spec says it uses a G.DMT ADSL modem which runs at a max of 8Mb/s. If you are getting around 13Mb/s then either you have a different box or I the spec is wrong. Cheers Kevin.

zonker84

I've been with Sky since April 22nd I think it was. I'm paying the £10 a month for their 16MB.

This week the service has been an absolute disgrace. When I joined, the woman told me that I was very near the exchange, so I would be able to get the full speed or very close to it. Yet several times late at night this week (usually around midnight, but sometimes a bit later), the connection has virtually died. I did a couple of speed test checks, and the speed was about 15-20kbps. Slower than dial up, meaning a lot of the stuff I was trying to do online was taking forever and a day as websites aren't designed for people with such slow connections. At times the speed can be up to about 8000kbps, but I simply have had enough of the ridiculous slowing down at night. It is costing me money as I place quite a few bets online for quite high amounts, and if the connection dies, it costs me money and has done this week.

I was with AOL for several years before on an 8MB connection, and while AOL have an awful lot of faults, downtime or the connection slowing to a halt is not one of them. I think I'm going to be on the phone to Sky tomorrow being extremely angry with them, because I've just been trying to watch baseball online through MLB.com which I've paid a subscription for, and it's impossible as the connection is just so slow.

My advice would be to certainly not get Broadband from Sky.

zonker84

Just done a speedtest, and I am getting 317kbps. This is a disgrace if you're paying for 16MB, and everything seems to be running a lot faster than a few minutes ago. Was probably running under 100kbps then.

louidog

....and another Orange user who is about to jump ship!

I too have been with Freeserve and Wanadoo with no problems until Orange took over. I have never been able to get any sense out of the customer service department who insist on talking to me while reading their scrip so their replies never change no matter what you ask them! To date I must have call at least twice a month to tell them I have no connection to which they reply "please try in a couple of hours"...thats fine but when I call at midnight I don't want to have to get out of bed 2 hours later to send a very important email!! I have also never received any refunds despite demanding them for loss of service. It seems I have never called them according to their records!

I have signed for the SKY £5 service and am waiting for my box now. I can get a 4meg signal and I am sure that will be fine. I just hope SKY will be fine for me as I know so many people who have it and are happy so far.

zonker84

Must just be me then.

Sky have cut me off for between 5 and 15 minutes four times since midnight tonight alone. It never seems to happen before midnight, but it's ridiculous. You phone them up, and they patronise you: "are you sure the website you were trying to look at was working?" , "is the wireless router connected to the ADSL filter, and is this connected to a phone line?" , "are you sure that your wiring or computer aren't damaged?"

Yet I keep getting cut off virtually every single night and they do nothing about it. Very disappointing.

penrhyn

Zonker, have you looked at your router stats, it may be they are marginal.
Have a look at this, their is also a useful utility to reconnect the router in the event of a disconnect.
http://www.skyuser.co.uk/forum/router-stats/10138-please-read-first-how-obtain-post-router-stats.html